


a world afterward

by neon_air



Series: think how i'm right here (ever, ever, ever) [3]
Category: Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies)
Genre: Avengers: Endgame (Movie) Compliant, Character Study, Gen, Hopeful Ending, Hurt Peter Parker, I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping, I wrote this in an hour, Light Angst, Post-Avengers: Endgame (Movie), Post-Spider-Man: Far From Home, Short, Spider-Man: Far From Home (Movie) Spoilers, literally i was just thinking bout this shit and started writing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-10
Updated: 2019-07-10
Packaged: 2020-06-25 17:27:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 940
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19750393
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/neon_air/pseuds/neon_air
Summary: Peter's world after Quentin Beck.





	a world afterward

**Author's Note:**

> this is a mess ajdnifbhdo i wrote this in like an hour bc i got thinking and just started writing. I HAVE FEELINGS ABOUT FAR FROM HOME OKAY 
> 
> anyway, take this for what you will, i had fun so fight me 
> 
> ALSO this is apart of the prompt series believe it or not so 
> 
> prompt: "What did I do wrong this time?"  
> prompt from @reverseblackholeofwords on tumblr

After Mysterio, Peter refused to call him Quentin Beck, he didn’t know Quentin Beck, Mysterio he knew.

After Mysterio, Peter cried. Overwhelmed, tired, scared, he cried. For himself, for May, for MJ and Ned, for Happy. He cried after Mysterio.

After Mysterio, Peter was hyper-vigilant. He had always been after becoming Spider-Man. There were too many risks, too many dangers he had to be aware of constantly. But this was different. He trained his sixth sense to work automatically, to run and scan and buzz the second something was wrong. When he woke up in the morning, he looked around himself and wouldn’t get up until he saw that everything was the same, until his sense remained calm and quiet. When he walked into a room, he would pause in the doorway and focus. What was out of place? Who looked unfamiliar? What set off his sense? If nothing was wrong, he’d continue. If something felt amiss, it’d only be a matter of seconds before Peter moved away.

After Mysterio, he trained himself to be faster (because illusion or not, the sight of MJ falling off the Eiffel Tower would never leave his mind) and stronger. Lighter on his feet, heavier in his hits, quicker in his thought process. He couldn’t afford the thought of what did I do wrong this time? while everything fell apart around him. He couldn’t afford to be a step behind, not when someone could be three ahead.

After Mysterio, Peter doesn’t trust as easily. The whole world knew his face now (even though Happy and Pepper said they were taking care of it, that it would be okay, and _please trust us, Peter_ , and believe it, the irony isn’t lost on Peter) but he kept up walls. He didn’t take off his mask, he didn’t give his name out. He’d smile and nod and shake your hand and wonder if something were to happen, how could you manipulate him? How could he stop that before it even crossed your mind?

(Him and MJ talked about it once. MJ told him it was a lonely way to live. Peter barely had it in him to hope it wouldn’t be, not with MJ, who _understood_ what it was like to be scared to trust, there.)

After Mysterio, Peter had new scars. Smaller ones this time around. So many of them littered across his body, peppering him like freckles, he lost count.

(Then there were the ones you couldn’t see. Sometimes Peter couldn’t see them either, too far into his own head to realize he was hurting.)

After Mysterio, Peter had nightmares. He always had. As a kid, it had been about the monsters under his bed and in his closet. Then it was about the monsters around him and the color of red drenching his uncle’s sweater and slathering itself on his hands. They were about failing parachutes, about drowning, about being left behind, about falling building and crashing airplanes and fire and being slammed into the ground over and over and over again. They were about attaching himself to the space ship and gasping for air and hearing Tony promise to catch him. They were about fighting a man, a titan, three times his sizes, about being swatted away like an actual spider, about turning to dust and _Mr. Stark, I don’t feel so good_ and _I’m sorry_. They were about waking up and being told five years had gone by and fighting some more and winning and losing and _losing Tony._ Then they were about green smoke and dissolving buildings and a stupid, comforting, betraying voice telling him that if he had just been better, then maybe Tony would be alive. They were about fighting droids and giving up EDITH and trusting Mysterio, trusting Quentin Beck, and having to trust himself.

After Mysterio, that was something that stuck with Peter. If he found himself lost, wandering, stumbling, bloody and cold, he had to trust himself. His sense would keep him alive if nothing else. And that was not a chance, that was not a guess or a reliance. That was a fact. He wouldn’t stop pushing himself until it was. Because if there came a day when someone like Mysterio came to Peter and smiled and encouraged and told him it was okay to be the smartest person in the room and that it would be okay, Peter had to be three steps ahead before they were.

After Mysterio, his world changed. It had already changed so much. First becoming Spider-Man, learning what that entailed, what that meant, then dying and coming back, then losing Tony. His world had flipped and turned in more ways than he could count within the last few years. But life was nothing if not ever-changing, and so once again, it twisted and shaped itself into something new. Peter had no idea what it would bring.

But after Mysterio, Peter knew that he could look to his left and see May, eyes fierce and steady, and Ned, jabbering and determined, and MJ, strong and tall and amazing. Then to his right, and see Happy, disgruntled but kind, and Pepper, sharp and quick and iron-willed, and Morgan, bumbling and smart and kind and there more for moral support than anything else.

After Mysterio, Peter knew the world would continue spinning. His world would too. He had a legacy to carry on, a group of people who loved him more than he thought possible, and a grip on his own reality.

After Mysterio, Peter was already looking out to the horizon, wondering who would be coming next, knowing he’d be ready.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! Comments and kudos are greatly appreciated!
> 
> Check out my tumblr: neon-air


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